Those Who Can Do, But Should Those Who Can Teach?

by John Aquino on 02/17/12

I have been reading about basketball great Michael Jordan and his difficulties as owner of the Charlotte Bobcats, which is on track to become the worst NBA team ever. It made me think again of the whole issue of who is the best person to teach others to do something.

A number of years ago I wrote a monograph for Phi Delta Kappa titled Artists as Teachers. I had originally wanted to have the subject be all professions, but the editors wisely instructed me to limit the scope to artists.

The idea for the monograph had actually started with my experiences as a young drama student. I remember I had an acting teacher at the Catholic University of America, the late Mark Hammer, who was a fine actor in his own right. If you want to see his work, rent the video of Much Ado about Nothing starring Sam Waterston that was produced by the Public Theatre in New York. I was doing a scene, and Mark said, “Something’s just not right. Here, let me show you how I would do it!” And he got on the stage and did the scene. After this happened a couple of times, I said, “Can you just tell me how I can do it better?” But he couldn’t.

Around the same time, a program was initiated called Artists in the Schools, by which artists—painters, musicians, actors—were hired to teach in elementary and high schools on the assumption that they would be the best people to teach in their arts. I later was the editor for Music Educators National Conference and in visiting schools met artists who were in completely over their heads as teachers.

There’s naturally an internal aspect of being artist that may not transfer well in communicating about the arts. Also at Catholic University, I met the actor and playwright Jason Miller. He was an excellent actor—you can see him in the film The Exorcist—and playwright—the Championship Season—but when he was brought in to talk in the playwrighting class I was taking he was not far from inarticulate when asked questions about how he wrote plays. I saw him later walking across campus with his head down and I said, “Hey, Mr. Miller!” and he kept walking, involved in some internal debate. It could have been me, but the same thing happened to others in my class.

So in writing Artists as Teachers, I talked to actors and artists about the topic and was surprised at how many times they used sports analogies. I was and am a baseball fan, and I came to the conclusion that many if not most of the great baseball players hadn’t gone on to be great managers. Look at Babe Ruth, Mickey Mantle, Joe DiMaggio, all Yankees, Walter Johnson, Ty Cobb, Willie Mays, and Hank Aaron. Their skills were mostly instinctive. They could do it themselves. But communicating to others on how to do it evidently wasn’t their forte.

The great managers tended to be those who had played ball professionally and been good players but not necessarily great ones. What they did have was the ability to stand back, look at how someone was running or throwing or swinging the bat, and tell them how to do it better. Look at Casey Stengel, Leo Durocher, Tommy Lasorda, Billy Martin, and Joe Torre.

I used the sports comparison to the arts in the monograph, and I also proved to myself that the analogy to sports supported my original concept that the issue has relevance for all professions.

When I first started working as an editor, I was turned down for jobs as editors of magazines in particular disciplines, and the people they hired were professionals in that discipline. The assumption was that it was easier to teach a mathematician, a biologist, a mortgage banker, or a musician how to be an editor than it was to have the editor learn enough about math, biology, mortgage banking, or music. These people ended up not being any more able to communicate about their field of expertise and to help others learn more about it than Babe Ruth was able to teach others how to hit.

Over the years I did serve as editor of magazines in the areas of music, mortgage banking, and environmental management, learning enough to be able to talk intelligently about their jobs with those working in the field and communicate in the magazine about what the major issues were.

As to Michael Jordan, he became an owner of the Washington Wizards in 1999 and returned to play in 2001. Even though he turned 40, he still averaged 20 points a game and three times shot over 40. He’d sometimes score more points than the rest of his team combined. And he would criticize them, saying they weren’t focused, and, implicitly, that they weren’t as good as he was. He not only couldn’t help them play better, he actually made them play worse since they were angry at his comments. And now his choices as an owner of the Bobcats have, shall we say, been ineffective.

Obviously, there was are musicians, poets, athletes, actors who have been good teachers. But it’s certainly not a given, and, to paraphrase George Bernard Shaw, those who can do, and those who can should not necessarily teach.

Copyright 2012 by John T. Aquino.